When my dad accepted a new job offer across the country last year, I learned to celebrate the journey even though I wasn’t the one embarking on it. It isn’t easy to do, but whether you are watching a loved one move, a child go to college, or parting ways for the final journey of all, I believe that in the Spirit’s grace and wisdom, we can find the strength to say our farewells with hope and love.

In this third poem from my collection “Wings Will Come: Journey,” I reflected on the day that my dad took his leap of faith, starting a whirlwind of events that I’ll continue to share next week with the fourth poem in the collection.

God bless

“Origami wings”
To Dad
the job offer is an origami crane
that can’t move,
a shelf ornament made in dreaming.
then, echoing through cool spring
air, I hear
the wings move.
you move.
I sit still, suddenly
the shelf-sitter,
fragile as rice paper while you
take to the air and shake off
the dust.
shock flattens me.
I am a paper leaf,
blank and white.
I want to fly with you,
I want to stay, want you
to stay,
but your wings are finally
moving and right now life
is what matters.
so I muster a breath of air
to lift you off:
Dad, that’s great!
but weighing me down is
Daddy, I will miss you.